Wishpond F-Commerce for the Brick & Mortar Set

If you are a local store looking to capitalize on the social media trend, and more specifically through Facebook, you might want to take a look at RetailConnect - launched last month by local shopping platform Wishpond.

The solution enables merchants to import their product data from point of sale systems (including prices, locations and product images), e-commerce sites or storefronts on eBay, Shopify and Google Merchant center and turn them into full fledged Facebook stores. Screenshots were a little hard to come by but we'll update this post as they become available.

Perhaps most interesting about RetailConnect is that it automatically refreshes merchant stores, monitoring inventory data in real time from the actual store and updating it on the Facebook page of the merchant - making it one of the few vendors to connect in such a way. The solution can even help merchants post promotions and other notifications on the walls of their fans. And all while gaining a few insights along the way. Analytics to dig into include data on location, age, gender, and even the number of users who action on a promotion.

According to a post on the Wishpond blog from July 2011, Wishpond RetailConnect is free to retailers with fewer than five bricks-and-mortar stores that have 100 or fewer items in their inventory. Paid plans start at $30 per month and go up to $300 per month for larger retailers with 25,000 or more products.